Affirming Two-Spirit Queer Indigenous Art History
As a queer and Two-Spirit artist from ocêkwi sîpiy/Fisher River Cree Nation in Manitoba, Monkman’s work renders Indigenous histories and realities that honor multiple genders, affirm expansive kinship, and accept multiple sexualities.
Indigenous societies in Turtle Island (North America) have accepted gender, sexual, and kinship fluidity as central to their worlds for millennia. Regularly suppressed by colonial powers, these realities became less visible for several generations. Two-Spirit is an inclusive term adopted by Indigenous peoples on gender and sexuality spectrums and stands in for their own communities’ historic words lost to time through settler colonialism. Monkman’s work honors and surfaces these lifeways as historical, valid for today, and vital for tomorrow.
The abbreviation 2SLGBTQIA+ is used here in place of many genders, sexualities, and kinship structures spanning Indigenous nations of North America: Two-Spirit, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans, Queer, Questioning, Intersex, Asexual, Agender, and More.
The Watchful Fox, Chief of the Tribe with Tinselled Buck no. 4,520
2008
Acrylic paint on canvas
Gift from Vicki and Kent Logan to the Collection of the Denver Art Museum, 2015.657
Reproduction © and courtesy Kent Monkman
This painting interprets artist George Catlin’s fascination for flamboyantly dressed, young Indigenous men in the 1830s whom he called “dandies” and “faint hearts.” When he tried to paint a portrait of a community member who was one of the kâ-wâsihkopayicik (sparkly ones), the Head Chief of the village forced Catlin to erase the chalk drawing. This erasure was due to the individual not being high-ranking enough to warrant a portrait rather than an effort to suppress their identity. However, Monkman’s lightly sketched background figure reminds us of Two-Spirit and queer peoples who were left out of much of art history for a variety of reasons.
Saturnalia
2017
Acrylic paint on canvas
Collection of Alfredo and Moira Romano
Reproduction © and courtesy Kent Monkman
Part of The Rendezvous series, Saturnalia explores the history of relationships that predate Western expansion, when Indigenous and non-Indigenous “mountain men” came together to trade and celebrate spring. Monkman suggests that away from the puritanical views of settler towns, these gatherings embraced diverse sexual, gender, and kinship practices, creating fuller expressions of who the men were and what they enjoyed. Such scenes support his aim to normalize a much fuller spectrum of love, affinity, and intimacy that has always existed.
Wild Flowers of North America
2017
Acrylic paint on canvas
Denver Art Museum: Gift of Brian A. Tschumper, 2024.827
Reproduction © and courtesy Kent Monkman
In this painting, Miss Chief encourages trappers and traders to throw off the strictures of narrow notions of gender and sexuality and to revel in the joys of life, nature, and desire. Monkman’s depiction of gender fluidity captures a sense of love and freedom outside of normative masculine roles that pervaded much of European colonial culture in North American settler towns.
Medicine
Kisê-manitow gave me … the gift of being both male and female and a multitude of spirits beyond gender together in one body … It was my role to help human beings love one another.
Celebrating Our Magic is a resource for Indigenous transgender and Two-Spirit youth, their relatives and families, and their healthcare providers.
Indigenizing Love is a resource to support Native youth, tribal communities, Two-Spirit and Native LGBTQIA+ collectives, community leaders, and partners.
The Trevor Project is a national organization providing crisis intervention and suicide prevention services to 2SLGBTQAI+ young people under 25.
The national Two-Spirit and Native LGBTQ+ Center for Equity is organized to restore Tribal and Indigenous traditions through training and technical assistance, advocacy, education, and resource building.
[Resources are available in English only]
The Far Reach of Colonialisms
The attempted dehumanization of Indigenous peoples through centuries of colonial expansion arose from European religion, statecraft, and race hierarchy. The harmful effects still deeply impact Indigenous realities to this day.
Settlers committed massacres to remove Indigenous peoples from their long-cared-for territories and forced survivors onto reservations that were often far from their ancestral territories, which were already severely reduced.
Before colonial expansion, many earlier relationships included nation-to-nation alliances and treaties. But most of these covenants were not respected by settler colonists, despite still being viable blueprints for cohesive cohabitation of peoples and places.
Kent Monkman: History is Painted by the Victors is organized by the Denver Art Museum and the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. It was developed with generous support from the D. R. Sobey Foundation, Terra Foundation for American Art, and Henry Luce Foundation, with additional support provided by the Birnbaum Social Discourse Project, The Christensen Fund, Walker Youngbird Foundation, Marilyn Carol and Robert Weaver, the donors to the Annual Fund Leadership Campaign, and the residents who support the Scientific and Cultural Facilities District (SCFD). Promotional support is provided by 5280 Magazine and CBS Colorado.
